For Staten Island botanist, poison frogs are his passion

Advance photo/Robin GeorgeRichard Lynch has more than 100 dyeing poison dart frogs, plus 150 tadpoles, a shelf filled with frog eggs, two dogs and a baker's rack stocked with live fruit flies crowded into his St. George home.

Richard Lynch, a local botanist, has the most unusual of alarm clocks: He wakens daily to the peculiar sound of amphibian mating calls. Criiick criiick. Ticki-ticki-ticki-ticki!

More than 100 dyeing poison dart frogs, plus 150 tadpoles, a shelf filled with frog eggs, two dogs and a baker's rack stocked with live fruit flies are crowded into his Monroe Avenue home. It's an equatorial marvel for nature-lovers and two lucky nephews.

Twenty-six terrariums fill the designated "frog room" and spill out into the five-room apartment that doubles as a tropical habitat.

"I don't have a lot of human furniture," said 47-year-old Lynch, a North Shore native, a vegan, and a regular at the Silver Lake Dog Park.

Lynch last week won the Leng and Davis prize accorded by the Staten Island Museum for helping to establish the Sweetbay Magnolia Biological Reserve Conservancy and the Greenbelt Native Plant Center in New Springville.

A scientist at work and at home, the naturalist spends at least 40 hours a week nurturing the frogs -- endangered, walnut-sized creatures that people have prized as much for their deadly poison as their dazzling colors.

What began in 1999 as a notion that animals could make a fun adjunct to his endangered plant collection has become a benign obsession for Lynch.

These days, his efforts help conserve these threatened dwellers of South American rain forests, and his research helps answer questions about how the species evolved.

"I've become totally consumed by them," said Lynch. "It's sort of like eating potato chips ..."

Lynch is, in part, seduced by the vibrant colors that distinguish his frogs -- blues that scream, yellows and oranges that flash. The frogs sit in stunning, yet meditative, silent within their glass-framed worlds, their backs shining like wax.

But more than their appearance, Lynch seems impressed by the frogs' ability to bond with him and each other.

"They let me know when they're hungry and act irritated if I'm 10 minutes late with their fruit flies," he said. "Most people might not form a personal relationship with a frog, but maybe that's what makes me special."

Lynch also cites his dart frogs' family values:

"They partner with their mates for a long time. Unlike [North American frogs], they lay only three to five eggs at a time, and are much more like mammals in the way that they care for their young. In the wild, the males would take the hatched eggs on his back and take them to a water site."

Life in St. George isn't so different from the one under the canopy.

Lynch's adult frogs live in pairs -- one couple per terrarium -- in habitats that are perfect for breeding. Each terrarium is equipped with a hollowed-out coconut "hut" with a petri-dish floor; this is where the love happens.

And Lynch is a capable Cupid.

Take, for example, his Giant Orange frogs, a sunset-colored pair that dies easily in captivity and is notoriously difficult to breed.

Lynch's Giant Orange female laid her 16th clutch of eggs last week; a 3-month old baby, thimble sized, nestled comfortably inside a hickory nut in the next room.

In another terrarium, a darling family of babies, just days after shedding the last vestiges of their tadpole-dom, sat on a rock together, the spitting images of their spotted orange parents, but no larger than push-pins.

These are the result of predictable courtships: The male sings his morning serenade, the female strokes his back, and the male locates a breeding site. They are also testaments to Lynch's skilled husbandry.

Such partnerships, encouraged by hobbyists throughout the world, will play a significant role in the survival of the species. Through Tree Walkers International, Lynch takes part in a consortium of individuals who share a common concern for amphibian conservation.

It's been suggested that the Giant Orange variety of poison dart frog is already extinct in the wild, Lynch said, because of mercury used in gold mining on the coast of French Guiana.

"In a zoo, you'd say [of these frogs], 'Oh, how pretty,' and you'd move on. I don't get to move on," said Lynch. "But this is all I need."

Tevah Platt covers the North and East Shores for the Advance. She may be reached at platt@siadvance.com.